Oldies Preservation Society had been running their Oldies format on KPKL/Spokane up until last week. KPKL 107.1 owner Bob Anthony Fogel, who sits on the OPS board, flipped the station to Christmas music as OPS moved to their newly acquired KEWU 89.5 FM, which was purchased from Eastern Washington University. EWU ran a Jazz format on 89.5. KEWU now brands as KOOL 89.5/Oldies.
KPKL signed on in September 1983 as KNOI, owned by Tri-County Broadcasting, with an adult contemporary format. Initially operating at just 3,000 watts from Deer Park, its signal didn’t fully cover Spokane.
Over the years, it evolved through various formats and ownerships. It faced significant downtime due to financial issues—off the air for 12 months in 2008–2009 and nine months in 2012 under previous owner KAZZ. In September 2012, the call letters changed to KPKL, and it was acquired by Spokane Broadcasting Company, LLC (Fogel), for $450,000.
KPKL settled into its Oldies format sometime around November 2012, becoming a staple for classic hits. The Christmas music is expected to run until at least the end of the year.
KEWU-FM is a non-commercial FM radio station licensed to Cheney, serving the Spokane metropolitan area and the Inland Northwest. The station traces its roots to April 7, 1950, when it signed on as KEWC, a 10-watt AM station operated by Eastern Washington University (EWU) as a student-run college radio outlet with free-form programming.
It moved to FM on November 11, 1963, as KEWU-FM. In 1986, power increased to 10,000 watts, and the format shifted to contemporary jazz, including classic, straight-ahead, and mainstream styles, plus blues, soul, funk, R&B, and big band. This era lasted nearly 40 years, earning accolades like JazzWeek’s Best Small Market Jazz Station (2005, 2015) and Best Small Market Jazz Programmer for director Elizabeth Farriss (2005, 2009, 2015).
In 2023, EWU announced plans to discontinue operations to repurpose resources for modern media like podcasting and digital recording, aligning with student career goals. Operations extended through May 2024, then further as the sale process unfolded. EWU donated its jazz library to Spokane Public Radio (KPBX/KPBZ) in 2024 to preserve the genre locally. On February 24, 2025, EWU agreed to sell the license to the Oldies Preservation Society (OPS) for $510,000 cash plus $300,000 in underwriting credits. The FCC approved the transfer, and OPS began programming on October 1, 2025, marking the station’s 75th anniversary.
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Oh what flashbacks!
November 6, 2025 at QZVX
Steve Sibulsky says:
Did my first-ever air shift on the old KEWC (AM) back in 1969…R-TV department was on the 2nd flor of the old student union…and the TV side in the old house across the street!